基本信息
書名：A Tree Grows in Brooklyn 布魯剋林有棵樹
難度：Lexile藍思閱讀指數810L
作者：Betty Smith
齣版社名稱：Harper Perennial
齣版時間：2005
語種：英文
ISBN：9780060736262
商品尺寸：13.5 x 2.1 x 20.3 cm
包裝：平裝
頁數：528

編輯推薦
這是一本關於生存的書，講述閱讀如何讓卑微的生命變得高貴，講述知識如何改變人的修為與命運，講述傢庭的力量如何支撐孩子實現自己的夢想。
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn《布魯剋林有棵樹》為美國作傢貝蒂·史密斯的經典之作，可稱為“傢小說”。它寫瞭弗蘭西一傢子的故事。一個感人的大故事裏鑲嵌著無數的小故事，而所有這些故事都圍繞著一個詞：感動。
本書曾被改編為電影、電視、音樂劇等多種形式，並曾獲得過奧斯卡奬。
推薦理由：
1. 青少年必讀成長經典，曹文軒先生力薦作品；
2. 多次入選美國中學課本，美國各大書店假期推薦必讀圖書；
3. 紐約公共圖書館“世紀之書”，與《小王子》、《夏洛的網》齊名，傳閱半個世紀，溫暖無數心靈！
4. 英文原版，內容無刪減，書後另附作者訪談及推薦閱讀等相關內容。

精彩書評：

“我想，在我成長過程中讓我很受感動的一本書就是《布魯剋林有棵樹》瞭。”——奧普拉·溫弗瑞
“如果錯過瞭《布魯剋林有棵樹》，你將失去一次重要的人生體驗……這是一個深刻理解童年與傢庭關係的動人故事。”——《紐約時報》
“《布魯剋林有棵樹》是一本讓人洞悉個體如何能變得更堅強、堅定、睿智的書。重要的是，它談及人要生存所需的人格力量，也就成瞭一篇關於愛、信任與磨難的文章。正是在讀完這本書後，我平生一次認識到，盡管磨難是一次艱難的考驗，但它確實是個人所能體驗的積極的人生影響因素之一。”——美國讀者
The American classic about a young girl’s coming-of-age at the turn of the century. This P.S. edition features an extra 16 pages of insights into the book, including author interviews, recommended reading, and more.
From the moment she entered the world, Francie needed to be made of stern stuff, for the often harsh life of Williamsburg demanded fortitude, precocity, and strength of spirit. Often scorned by neighbors for her family’s erratic and eccentric behavior-such as her father Johnny’s taste for alcohol and Aunt Sissy’s habit of marrying serially without the formality of divorce-no one, least of all Francie, could say that the Nolans’ life lacked drama. By turns overwhelming, sublime, heartbreaking, and uplifting, the Nolans’ daily experiences are tenderly threaded with family connectedness and raw with honesty. Betty Smith has, in the pages of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, captured the joys of humble Williamsburg life-from “junk day” on Saturdays, when the children of Francie’s neighborhood traded their weekly take for pennies, to the special excitement of holidays, bringing cause for celebration and revelry. Betty Smith has artfully caught this sense of exciting life in a novel of childhood, replete with incredibly rich moments of universal experiences—a truly remarkable achievement for any writer.
Review
“A profoundly moving novel, and an honest and true one. It cuts right to the heart of life… If you miss A Tree Grows in Brooklyn you will deny yourself a rich experience.” —New York Times
“One of the most dearly beloved and one of the finest books of our day.” —Orville Prescott
“One of the books of the Century.” —New York Public Library
內容簡介
Growing up in the dirty, crime-ridden tenements of Brooklyn in the early 1900s, Francie Nolan has to be tough to survive. Determined to become a writer, Francie fights her way out of the slums with the resilience of the “Tree of Heaven,” a special tree that can grow and thrive even in the most inhospitable environments.
二十世紀初的紐約布魯剋林，是一片寜靜的樂土，而在這裏，一顆本應無憂無慮的幼小心靈卻要被迫去麵對艱辛的生活，體味成長過程中的無奈百味：母親偏愛她的弟弟，父親深愛她卻英年早逝，傢境清貧，在學校飽受輕鄙……麵對如此坎坷人生，她也曾苦悶、憂愁，卻始終保持著那份尊嚴和知識改變命運的信念。人生的另一扇大門終於為她打開。
作者簡介
Betty Smith was born Elisabeth Wehner on December 15, 1896, the same date as, although five years earlier than, her fictional heroine Francie Nolan. The daughter of German immigrants, she grew up poor in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, the very world she recreates with such meticulous detail in A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Smith also wrote other novels and had a long career as a dramatist, writing one-act and full-length plays for which she received both the Rockefeller Fellowship and the Dramatists Guild Fellowship. She died in 1972.
貝蒂·史密斯（1896—1972），德國移民的女兒，成長於紐約布魯剋林的威廉斯堡。她的經曆與這部小說主人公弗蘭西相似，早年也是靠自學完成瞭初步的知識積纍。後來她進入大學學習新聞、戲劇、寫作和文學。《布魯剋林有棵樹》是其主要作品，曾被改編為電影、電視、音樂劇等多種形式，並曾獲得過奧斯卡奬。她還是一位劇作傢，一生寫過多部獨幕劇和完整的長篇戲劇，曾獲洛剋菲勒基金會和戲劇傢協會基金會資助。
精彩書摘
Serene was a word you could put to Brooklyn, New York. Especially in the summer of 1912. Somber, as a word, was better. But it did not apply to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Prairie was lovely and Shenandoah had a beautiful sound, but you couldn’t fit those words into Brooklyn. Serene was the only word for it; especially on a Saturday afternoon in summer.
Late in the afternoon the sun slanted down into the mossy yard belonging to Francie Nolan’s house, and warmed the worn wooden fence. Looking at the shafted sun, Francie had that same fine feeling that came when she recalled the poem they recited in school.
This is the forest primeval. The murmuring
pines and the hemlocks,
Bearded with moss, and in garments green,
indistinct in the twilight,
Stand like Druids of eld.
The one tree in Francie’s yard was neither a pine nor a hemlock. It had pointed leaves which grew along green switches which radiated from the bough and made a tree which looked like a lot of opened green umbrellas. Some people called it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in the tenements districts.
You took a walk on a Sunday afternoon and came to a nice neighborhood, very refined. You saw a small one of these trees through the iron gate leading to someone’s yard and you knew that soon that section of Brooklyn would get to be a tenement district. The tree knew. It came there first. Afterwards, poor foreigners seeped in and the quiet old brownstone houses were hacked up into flats, feather beds were pushed out on the window sills to air and the Tree of Heaven flourished. That was the kind of tree it was. It liked poor people.
That was the kind of tree in Francie’s yard. Its umbrellas curled over, around and under her third-floor fire-escape. An eleven-year-old girl sitting on this fire-escape could imagine that she was living in a tree. That’s what Francie imagined every Saturday afternoon in summer.
Oh, what a wonderful day was Saturday in Brooklyn. Oh, how wonderful anywhere! People were paid on Saturday and it was a holiday without the rigidness of a Sunday. People had money to go out and buy things. They ate well for once, got drunk, had dates, made love and stayed up until all hours; singing, playing music, fighting and dancing because the morrow was their own free day. They could sleep late — until late mass anyhow.